


Seeing the Whole Board

by lasairfhiona



Category: West Wing
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-19
Updated: 2012-09-19
Packaged: 2017-11-14 15:14:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,106
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/516716
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lasairfhiona/pseuds/lasairfhiona
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Sam, you're going to run for President one day.  Don't be scared.  You can do it.  I believe in you."  Jed Bartlet.</p><p>Written post "Hartfield Landing"  so anything that happened in later episodes is considered null and void</p>
            </blockquote>





	Seeing the Whole Board

Too nervous to sit still, Leo McGarry stood in the middle of the Bartlet family room. With the remote pressed to his chin, he watched as the final numbers slowly came in for the Presidential Election. They were getting down to the wire and he was getting antsy about the results. There hadn't been an election since 2002 he'd had more than a vested interest in – those were his people up there. Part of him wished he was there and had something more to do than sit and flip between news programs. He'd been invited to come to California for all the election hoopla, they all had. Instead, however, he chose to stay in New Hampshire with Jed and Abbey. He'd had his day in the spotlight as Chief of Staff for two terms. It was their turn to enjoy it without the shadow of the past hanging over them. The scene on the television changed. It flipped from the news correspondents, who had been analyzing the numbers and making prediction as each state reported in, to the Seaborn for President headquarters.

"Here he comes," Leo said turning to where Jed sat on the sofa, head bowed, half asleep. It had been a long night waiting for the west coast results and at almost 2 am on the east coast it was finally time.

The former President, unlike Leo, had dozed off and on as the night wore on. Hearing Leo's voice, he came fully awake and watched as the young man who had been his Deputy Communications Director walked on the podium with his wife, their children, followed by Josh Lyman, his former Deputy Chief of Staff and Andrea Wyatt, the future Vice-President. "The next generation," he muttered then chuckled when he heard Leo's, "Yeah."

"Déjà vu," Abbey Bartlet said as she walked in wearing a robe hastily thrown over her pajamas, and joined the two men in her life. She had gone to bed, leaving them alone to watch the continuing coverage. She didn't need to be there as Leo argued with the commentators and complained about the quality of the coverage. She didn't have Jed's ability to tune him out when he was on a roll. If she thought about it, Leo and Jed did that to each other and had for years. She had tried to read but ended up looking at her own memories of past election nights. She'd been through quite a few as Mrs. Josiah Bartlet. 

It had been a long time since it felt strange to Abbey to have Leo around all the time. Being retired, he'd came to help her and the girls almost ten years ago when Jed had an episode and hadn't bounced back as quickly as he should have. Then at their insistence, he stayed on to recover from his own heart attack nearly six years ago. It hadn't taken her and Jed long to convince him to just move into the farm with them. The girls were long gone and leading their own lives and it was better than Leo living alone and running up phone bills to talk to Jed about the state of the country. Now the two long time friends could play chess, write each other's memoirs, and argue about politics all day if they wanted to. It was to the point where Abbey often joked about her 'two' husbands, but she always did it with a smile, she'd come to depend more and more on Leo's presence over the years.

Leo turned and watched as she stopped behind where Jed was sitting on the sofa and set her hands on his shoulders, massaging them gently. He smiled, it seemed like that was Abbey's position for comforting or expressing any number of sentiments to Jed or him. "Yeah," he replied simply. 

"They're us, twenty years ago," Abbey mused as she walked around the sofa and grabbed Leo, pulling him away from his position in front of the television and over to the sofa. "Sit," she instructed as she pushed him down next to Jed. "Mallory is tough enough to handle them," she said as she sat down on the other side of her husband. She'd known Leo's daughter since she was a child and knew the metal Mallory was made of.

Leo looked at his daughter and the two men with her. It still amazed him she ended up with Sam. Their relationship had been fraught with problems from the get go but somewhere along the line they managed to put everything else aside make it work for them. Abbey was right, Mallory was tough enough to handle Sam and Josh, just as she'd been strong enough to handle him and Jed.

The similarities between now and then were uncanny. It was Sam, however, who bore the most resemblance. He was so much like Jed -- they were both idealistic men who wanted to save the world. God knows, they were also both given to spouting some bit of historical trivia, it's reference to the topic at hand often questionable. Although, truth be known, Jed was by far the worst offender of the two as anyone from his administration could attest.

Then there was Josh -- he was never too far from the political arena, it was in his blood. It was who he was. Leo was responsible for Josh being in the Bartlet Administration, he'd gone to him and used an old family friendship to get him to come to New Hampshire the first time. The rest was history. Josh, unlike the rest of them, had stayed in the White House when Jed's two terms were up. He became a part of Hoynes's team and continued to do the work he loved. It was when Hoynes's terms were up that he went to Sam and said, it was time. Josh prepared Sam, just as he had prepared Jed. And now his protégé was going to be doing the same thing for his best friend that Leo had done for his.

Sam's choice for a running mate had surprised them all at first but in the end it made sense. Andrea Wyatt had spent years in Congress. She knew, probably better than Sam, how the wheels of Congress worked. Plus she had experience on several important policy setting committees. She was a perfect choice to balance out Sam. Not to mention he'd be getting his old boss back as well. Andi and Toby had somehow managed to reconcile to the surprise of everyone who'd seen their sometimes-explosive public disagreements. Arguments aside, Leo knew the couple had never completely let go of their feelings for one another. Toby had often been the conscience of the Bartlet Administration and he and Sam were so well attuned to one another it was often scary to watch them work. Leo knew that Toby's presence wouldn't just be as the Vice President's spouse. He had a feeling Toby would be a regular visitor to the oval.

As he sat on the sofa with Jed and Abbey, Leo remembered what it had been like to stand up with them when they had done what most people had thought was impossible and won the election. He felt Jed take his hand. The gentle squeeze told him, the former President shared his thoughts. Together they watched as the Republican opponent came on the screen and conceded the election. He returned Jed's slight squeeze to his hand as Sam and Andi stepped up to the microphone flanked by their families and Josh. A mirror of how he followed Jed and Abbey.

The crown hushed as Sam began to speak,

  
_"I use to be a speech writer. Words were my friends. They were the tools I used to convey thoughts and ideas. However, at this moment I find myself suddenly at a loss for words."_

Leo and Jed both laughed. They could remember times when Sam had fumbled to find the right word to express himself. Of course, they could also remember when Sam has also been hard to shut up. Quieting as Sam found his words and began to speak, they listened as he told them about his hopes for the future and what they, he and Andi, wanted to accomplish then ended by thanking the people who helped his campaign.

 __

They watched as Andrea stepped back, reaching for Toby's hand, and Sam reached for Mallory. Pulling her closer to his side with their children gathering in around them.

 _"Most importantly, my wife, Mallory, and my children, Tom, Lindsey, and Beth, for sticking by me through all the obstacles, road trips and everything else that has been thrown in our path._

 _My father-in-law, Leo, for without whom I never would have met the woman I love and have the children I adore."_

Leo closed his eyes and took a deep breath when he heard Sam's words. He could see Jenny in the background, where she had been for most of the campaign, helping with the children. But to have Sam single him out instead of thanking both of Mallory's parents, it overwhelmed him. Leo was so caught up in his emotions, he never noticed Abbey standing up and circling around the back of the sofa until he felt her hands on his shoulders and felt the gentle squeeze.

Blinking back the tears that threatened to fall, Leo watched as Sam then pulled Josh up next to him.

 _"Once upon a time I left the world of politics behind to work in the public sector. I was happy and had no aspirations of going back to Washington, until Josh showed up at my door, dripping wet, telling me he'd found it, he'd found the *real thing*._

 _"Suddenly I was walking away from a career and everything I thought I wanted to go to work as a speechwriter. It was the best decision of my life. I spent eight years working for 'the real thing' and it was the best eight years of my life – until now._

 _"There is one night I will always remember. It was over a game of chess I was told I would run for President. That I shouldn't be afraid, he knew I could do it, because he believed in me. After he walked out of my office, I sat there stunned he would say those things to me. But those words were the seeds that have brought me here tonight. He believed in me then, just as you have shown your belief in me today._

 _"I just wanted to say – Thank you sir, I finally saw the whole board."_

 _"Thank you, all of you."_

They watched in silence as Sam, Mallory, and the children stepped away from the podium followed by Josh amid the cheers. When the news anchors came back on, Leo lifted the remote and clicked off the television, plunging the room into near darkness. They didn't want or need to hear any more commentary about the election or what Sam and Andi's victory meant for the future.

"He's a good boy," Abbey stated, breaking the silence before leaning forward and kissing both Jed and Leo on the cheek.

"He had a good role model and teacher," Leo replied, squeezing the hand he still held.

Covering Leo's hand and holding it between his own, Jed simply said, "So did Josh." Shifting so he could see his wife, Jed lifted a hand and touched Abbey's cheek as she leaned between he and Leo.

"Bedtime," Abbey declared, using the fact it been an emotional night for all of them, fraught with good and bad memories. They, like she, had their own memories of two other nights like this. Nights when Leo had been so sure Jed would win the elections no matter what the odds were against him, especially the re-election. Life in the White House hadn't been a fairy tale, but neither was it all bad. She and Jed had made it through the hard times – the MS scandal, the re-election. Their love being the glue that kept them together.

Leo helped Jed to his feet and then into the wheelchair he now used most of the time. Jed had beaten the odds with the MS but the one thing he hadn't been able to beat was age, and Age was taking its toll on him, as a result his periods of remission were getting shorter and shorter.

As Leo pushed him from the room, Jed reached out for Abbey's hand, giving it a gentle squeeze. "He did it," he said to both of them with the pride of a parent. "He saw the whole board."


End file.
